A Craving

A CRAVING

Curtains of pastel lights, with its flood of green and blue, and a dash of pink, dance over an old log cabin that lies in the shadow of the North Pole. This cabin is nestled next to a creek in a remote valley in the Brooks Range of Alaska. It is Christmas Eve and the sun has been down for over a month and the temperature is at the bottom of its tiny little tube, but inside, it is snug and warm. The cabin is noisy with three grandchildren and a grizzled old prospector who is babysitting. His wife and pregnant daughter decided to make an emergency trip to Fairbanks. Another grandchild was coming to the family.

           The grandfather was enjoying his young company, even though they were loud and exhausting. But it was still a great midwinter’s break.

           “Grandpa,” little Useless was sitting in his grandfather’s lap. “Will you make us some popcorn?”

Little Useless, at five years old was the youngest of the three grandchildren. His Christian name was Ulysses, like his grandfather. But the grandfather called him Useless and the name stuck. His sister, Samantha, was the oldest at ten. Everyone called her Sam and the middle child was Robert, or Robbie.

“Popcorn?” the grandfather stroked his thick gray beard in thought. “Well lad, I be think-en that’s a grand idea. But, I am not used to work-en in the kitchen. The only pans I work with are gold pans. “Sam,” hollered the grandfather. “Does ya know where your grandmother hides the pop-en corn?”

           The ten-year-old girl rolled her bright eyes. She knew dang well that her grandfather knew where the popcorn was. “Yes, grandpa. I suppose you want me to pop it too.”

           That would be big of you lass.” The grandfather knew that she would. Being the only woman in the cabin, she knew that she was in charge of her men. And she took her job seriously.

           She scooped a handful of corn and carefully dumped it into a deep pan.

           “Grandpa, where is the bear fat?”

           “On the window sill, Sam.” The grandfather stood up and set Useless on his chair and then added a couple of logs to the fire. He poked at it and then it cackled and spit sparks at him. He chuckled, then picked up the youngest and eased himself back into his easy chair.

           Robbie was on a chair next to his sister; watching and willing the first kernel to pop. When it did, he yelped and fell off the chair and then giggled in delight. Sam quickly capped it with its lid and then she began shaking the pan like a fireman at a fire-pump when his own house was on fire.

            With a huge bowl of bear-buttered popcorn, sprinkled with a generous blizzard of salt, they sat around the fire. It was time for another one of the grandfather’s stories. He paused and then fondly smiled at Sam. She raised her inquisitive eyebrows. The grandfather looked sadly at his empty coffee cup. Sam rolled her eyes and snatched the cup then walked the three steps to the kitchen-corner of the cabin.

           The iron cooking stove had two jobs in life. One was the keep the cabin warm and the other was to always have the coffee hot. Sam poured.

           “Leave room for a little sweetener, lass.”

           “I know, I know.” Came her indignant scoff. “I wasn’t born yesterday!”

           ‘Damn near,’ thought the grandfather to himself.

           Once the proper amount of good Irish-sweetened was added and tested, the grandfather started his story.

           “Did I ever tell you about the time your grandmother got a severe craving for shrimp?”

           Robbie answered for his siblings He always had more question than a hound had fleas. “No grandpa. What is shrimp?”

           “Useless,” laughed Sam, which made her grandpa belly laugh, which was contagious, and then they all laughed. Useless laughed best, even though he had no idea why.

           The grandfather paused his story to explain what a shrimp was.

           “Well, Robbie,” his grandpa gathered his thoughts and sipped his toddy while trying to think the best way to describe something these kids had never seen before.

           “A shrimp is a…a gray frog with no legs. It has a long flat tail he swims with, and he has whiskers and two tiny, black, beady eyes.” He leaned back and studied their faces. They soon nodded, as a mental image formed in their young trusting heads.

           “And they are very tasty.” He explained.

The grandfather then went back to his story.

           “This was our first winter in this cabin and your grandmother was very pregnant with your mother.” The grandfather chuckled and added, “She was rounder than a blimp and had just as much gas.”

           “Gas?” questioned Sam.

           “Yep, she farted a lot.”

           The boys rolled on the floor laughing, as did their sister.

           “‘Uley,’ she says to me, ‘I be needin' some shrimp.’ ‘Shrimp?’ says I. And where in Sam Hill does ya… And before I could finish, she burst out crying.

           “I felt smaller than a shrimp. Then I remembered seeing cans of it at Murphy’s Tradin' Post in Bettles. ‘There, there,’ I said as I tried to put my arms around her to comfort her. ‘I will get you shrimp, darlin'.’ My arms only made it about halfway around the sweet little thing.

           “She smiled at me and I put on my parka. ‘I will get back as fast as I can,’ I told her.

           “Bettles is about thirty-five miles south of here. A good day’s walk in summer; and in winter, with snowshoes, with good weather, maybe two days. But I gathered enough supplies for a round trip of ten days. You never know what can happen out there. I stuffed my pack and grabbed my rifle. The sooner I left, the sooner I’d be back.”

           The grandfather paused his story when he heard a distant wolf howl to his mate a long ways off. He then thought about his mate in Fairbanks and began missing her.

           “Aye, God was smiling on me. The moon was three-quarters full and cycling bigger each day. It was the only light this time of year and with the clear sky and new snow, it was as bright as a cloudy summer’s day. But without a blanket of clouds, it was dang cold.

           “I pushed on the first day even after the moon went down. The trail was good and the light of a billion stars showed me the way. I finally became too tired and too cold to wander on. So I took my snow-shoe and shoveled three foot of powdered snow over a tarp and then crawled under it and slept until the moon came up the next day.”

           “You slept under the snow, grandpa?” asked Robbie. “Why didn’t you freeze?”

           “The snow insulates you against the cold.”

           “How?” asked the young-en.

           “I don’t know. It is some kind of special freak of nature.”

           “Well, I don’t believe it.”

           “Well lad, I don’t blame you. I didn’t believe it until some Indian told me about it.”

           Robbie folded his indignant arms, “I think the Indian was tricking you.”

           “Well, it worked, lad. Cause I am still alive.”

           Robbie thought about it a minute and then got distracted when his sister slid the popcorn bowl in front of him.

           “On the second day, I woke up hungry and warm.”

           “Liar.”

           “Fine, Robbie. I was damn cold. I got up and stomped around until I warmed up a bit. I then ate dried moose jerky as I headed back down the trail. I would be in Bettles in a few hours if everything went to plan. But old Mother Nature played a trick on me.”

           The grandchildren gasped, “What?” They gave him their full attention.

           “A foreboding cloud crept in and dimmed the moon. It darkened. The temperature began warming. A Chinook wind, a warm south wind, began blowing and then its dark cloud covered the moon and the stars. And then snowflakes began falling from the black sky. I was walking blind and in circles. I was hopelessly lost.”

           The grandfather jumped to his feet, which startled his audience. It also amused him. “We be needin' more firewood.”

           “But, but…”

           “No buts. Put your parkas on.”

           The grandfather ushered his grandchildren out into forty-plus below. He stopped Useless at the door and handed him the fire poker. “Here lad. I be needin' you to guard the cabin. “If-en ya see any wolves, be sure to whack 'em good. Does ya think ya can do that for me?”

           “Yes, grandpa.” He said with a confident smile, and then his nervous, wary eyes began searching the dark shadows. Shortly armfuls of spruce logs scurried back inside.

           They quickly sat in front of grandpa Uley and, with hands under their chins, asked, “How did you get unlost, grandpa?”

           “The river, lass, the Koyukuk River. Bettles lies on this river. It be the highway ta town. It flows from the foothills east of here and empties into the Tanana River in the west. If I keep headin' south, I can’t miss it.”

           Ole doubting Robbie asked, “If it was dark and snowing, how do you know which way is south?”

           But the story-telling grandfather always had an answer. A good one this time.

           “I had me trusty compass, lad, and it can see in the dark.”

           Grandpa Uley continued. “The temperature, she rose with the wind. She went from twenty below to twenty above in less than an hour. The snow became wet and heavy.

           “I lost the trail and kept going south. The snow deepened and even with my snowshoes on, I was sinkin' to me waist in places. I was beginning to sweat, which is a death-sentence in this country. I needed to find the river and shelter. I needed a fire.

           “I trudged on for another hour, and things were lookin' mighty bad, I lost hope. I had been prayin' for a little help from above, but things seemed to get worse. ‘God’s Blood,’ I cursed.”

           Sam gasped. “You cursed God?”

           The grandfather nodded his shameful head.

           “Does grandma know?”

           The grandfather shook his shameful head. “And don’t you be tellin' her, lass.”

           Sam sighed. “Okay, I won’t. But you promise that you won’t ever curse again.”

           Her grandpa nodded and lied, “I promise.”

           “Where was I?” He stroked his unkempt beard and picked up where he left off.

           “I knew I had to be close. I kept walking. The snow had drifted over the banks of the river I were aimin' for, and suddenly I dropped through the soft snow and landed on the frozen river’s edge. I was saved. I took off my snowshoes and began digging an upward cave in the thick snowdrift. The blowing snow closed the opening behind me. I dug a shelf for my gear and one to sleep on. I lit three candles and the place shined like a palace, and then it warmed up.”

           “Liar,” said Robbie.

           The grandfather laughed at the inquisitive youth, but he wasn’t lying that time.

           “The next day the storm got worse. I stayed hunkered in my crude igloo. I had plenty of candles and jerky. I was fine, but by the next day, I got bored. So’s, I began singing Christmas songs. And well I be danged if-in a wild critter didn’t show up.”

           The grandfather paused his story for a quick lesson in animal husbandry. “Say, pound for pound, does ya know what the meanest, orneriest, cussedest, animal there is?”

           “The shark,” said Sam.

           “Nope.” The grandfather looked at Useless and the boy shrugged his shoulders. He looked at his brother. “How about you lad?”

           Robbie nodded. “It’s you, grandpa.”

           The grandfather laughed.

           “Okay, the second cussedest animal in the world is the weasel.

           “This far north, they be called ermine. In summer they be brown and in winter they are white with a black tip on their tail that matches their beady, little eyes. Apparently, this one liked me singing. Or maybe my smell. Or maybe the jerky I was gnawing on.

           “Anyway, he sauntered up to my candle shelf and stood on his back legs. We were eye to eye and there was no fear in his. He was no bigger than a banana. I admired his spunk and tossed him a piece of jerky. I liked him right off. I have had worse friends.”

           The grandfather leaned back in his chair and rubbed his eyes. “What time is it anyway?” He wasn’t concerned about his grandchildren being up late; it was he was getting a tad tired.

           Sam, not wanting to miss any more of his story, quickly fetched him a cup of coffee. After two sips and a sigh, he leaped back into his story.

           “I was plum tuckered out and slept like the dead that night. When I woke up the day was blacker than coffee. I found a match and lit my candles; all of them, it was cold. And then I heard it.”

           Little Useless gasped, “What?”

           “Nothin', lad. Cause there was no wind. The storm had done blown itself out. I quickly stuffed my sleeping bag in my pack and crawled out into a beautiful star-lit night… or day? I put on my snowshoes and worked my way up the river. Except for the deep snow, I now had a flat wide road. I felt good and well-rested; when I went around the next point in the river, I could see the dim lanterns of town. And old Murphy was out shovelin' the fresh snow away from his tradin' post door.

           “I walked up and took off my wide shoes and asked him the time. ‘Eight-thirty,’ he says. ‘AM or PM’, I asked. He chuckled and understood how one can lose track when ya have no sun to mark the days. ‘It is a fine Friday morning.’ He said, ‘Ya mean Thursday, don’t ya?’

           “As he shook his head, I realized I had slept over twenty-four hours last night. Now I was runnin' late.”

           The grandfather took a sip of his coffee and saddened his face.

           “But that was not the worst part. Someone had bought up all the caned shrimp.”

           “Oh no, grandpa,” sighed Sam. “What did you do? Did you go back to grandma without the shrimp?”

           “Well lass, I considered it. But I had come too far to quit. So I asked old Murphy, ‘Who was this evil man that bought up my shrimp?’

           “‘Indian Karl’ he said. ‘Sazea, his wife is pregnant and got a craving. He lives a day’s walk upriver.’

           “I knew where he lived. I figured I could buy a few cans from him. He was my good friend. And if he didn’t want to sell them, I would kill him.”

           “Granpaaaa!”

           The grandfather chuckled. He knew that the lie would add to his story.

           “Indian Karl is his white-man name. I use his real name, Kuzih, which means, Great Talker. He invited me to spend the night and to leave at moon-up. He gave me the canned shrimp. It seems the craving was for frog legs and he brought home the wrong cans. When he opened the first can and saw how ugly they were, they were afraid to eat 'em. He were glad I got them out of his house.

           “But I was unable to leave the next day. Somewhere downriver, the water under the ice became clogged and the river backed up over its layer of ice, creating thick slush and hidden holes. I now had to wait for it to refreeze before I could cross. And it took two more days. Your grandma, she knew I took ten days of supplies with me, so I knew she wouldn’t start to worry much, yet.”

           The grandfather stood up and stretched. It was time to pee. Being gentlemen they let Sam use the outhouse first. Once she was inside, they quickly just peed off the porch.

“I crossed the frozen river under a full moon. The wet heavy snow froze and it held me weight without wearin' those clumsy snowshoes. So, I made good time comin' home.

           Your grandmother was happy to see me, although she wouldn’t admit it. ‘What took you so long?’ she snapped at me, but I could see her pretty eyes just a grinnin' at me. I told her that had a little bad weather and stayed in Murphy’s backroom.

           “‘Playin' cards and tellin' stories, I suspect,’ she said.”

           “Why didn’t tell her about the snowstorms and sleeping with a cussed, weasel?” asked Sam.

           “Ermine,” corrected the grandfather. “If I done told her about all the times’ Mother Nature tested me and how I cheated death, she would not send on these simple errands. Now, lass, what would be the fun in that?”

           “So, you didn’t tell grandma about sleeping in the snow?” indignantly questioned doubting Robbie. “Why are you so old?”

           The grandfather chuckled. “Lucky, I guess.”

           He then turned on the old radio. As he adjusted the knobs, looking for the only channel the reached this far in the bush, it squealed and squawked as he fine-tuned it looking for the magic voice on the other end.

           The grandchildren gathered tightly around waiting for news about their mother and if they had a new brother or sister on this festive Christmas eve.

           While they waited Sam asked, “Did grandma like her Shrimp?”

           “She loved every last bite.” Grandpa Yulie chuckled. “But then, they made her sick and she threw-up the rest of the night.”

           The voice on the radio finally came in loud and clear, but he still had no news about their mother.

“Grandpa, will you tell us another story?”

“Stay tuned,” said the man on the radio.